Gospel Mystery of Christ in Everyone

Gospel Mystery of Christ in Everyone

Ephesians 3:3a

This is probably one of the most important days, to my mind, for our study of Ephesians. This seems to me to be the key to the gospel that God has given us. So, you’ll find it in Ephesians 3:3. And of course, Paul does go on for a few verses, so we’ll obviously be spending more than just today on this verse. But at least this will introduce the subject clearly to you, if it needs any introduction. Ephesians 3:3, now we’ve reached. He says in Verse 1, “For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles – assuming that you’ve heard of the stewardship of God’s grace that was given to me for you,” v.3, “How the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly.” The mystery: that’s really it. “How the mystery was made known to me by revelation.” And he refers to that mystery in different places in the New Testament.

I never bothered with it in the early years. I thought, “Oh, he just means the gospel.” And then I thought, “Well, he must mean more than that.” But I thought, “Well, I don’t know what he meant,” so I just let it be: “How the mystery was made known to me by revelation.” For a while it’s easy to accept the conventional statement, “Oh the mystery is that the gospel was for the Gentiles as well as the Jews.” But really the truth is, that’s no great mystery, and there’s nothing difficult it seems, to understand about this.

But what is the "mystery was made known to me by revelation?" If you look up then, the RSV, it gives you a couple of references. And the first one is Romans 16:25 that makes reference to it again, simply. “Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret for long ages but is now disclosed and through the prophetic writings is made known to all nations, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith.” So it’s elaborated a little more there, "the revelation of the mystery which was kept 'secret' for long ages but is now disclosed and through the prophetic writings is made known to all nations."

So, that kind of verse made me think, “Oh well, maybe this is something.” And of course those of us who have studied theology think of the Gnostics and all of the "hidden knowledge" that became popular there in the first century, second century AD. And you think, “Oh, maybe it’s something mysterious like that, something esoteric that only the few advanced spiritual people know.” So it interested me but I really didn’t know what it was, "But is now disclosed and through the prophetic writings is made known to all nations." Generally, I just kind of dismissed it virtually as the gospel, that you were saved by grace through faith and not by the law, and then that was made available to the Gentiles as well. But it never satisfied me completely, and yet I had no understanding really of what it was until these recent years.

You get a little further in 1 Corinthians 2:7. And of course, you know the way we do that: we look up the concordance and find the cross references. And so you get a little further in 1 Corinthians 2:7, “But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glorification.” And that arouses your interest, “Which God decreed before the ages for our glorification.” So it’s as if God decreed something so that we would be glorified. "To be glorified" is to be seen as we really are. So that we would – that’s what we really mean by the 'glory of God': God as he really is. We shall see him. We shall be like him for we shall see him as he is. "We shall share his glory and reflect his glory," is the promise. So it’s being as we are, to be seen for what we are.

And then it seems to me that the answer is found in another cross reference in Colossians 1:27. “To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is 'Christ in you', the hope of glory.” Now, I know that that seems like a letdown, maybe, to you, but it seems to me the mystery that Paul is talking about that has been decreed from before the foundation of the world is what we have been sharing for some time.

And it’s based on those – you don’t need to look it up. If you just listen to me you’ll remember the verses. "Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation. In him all things hold together." And then Ephesians 2:10, “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” And then, of course, the one in 2 Corinthians where, "Christ has died for all and therefore all have died." It seems to me it’s that truth that we have been discovering over these months and years now, that Jesus is not just "more than a prophet," as we say. "Mohammad is a prophet. Buddha is a religious leader, but Jesus is more than a prophet. Jesus is the Son of God." It’s not just that, but that each one of us has been made in Jesus. That’s how we came into existence, before the beginning of the world, when he himself was the first-born of all creation, when he was not only God’s divine Son, but was the first human being.

He was the first-born of all creation. And inside him God made all the rest of us. And so we have been part of Christ from -- away from the beginning, and that he bore us, and bore all our willfulness in himself, and allowed that to be borne by his Father inside him. And then, inside him was expressed the agony and the pain that that caused him and his Father; that dreadful agony whereby he, himself even went through death, and went through separation from his Father, and then that in him we were all remade. And what we have here is a picture of life if it were lived without him and also the opportunity ourselves to accept that we are in him and that he is in us.

Now loved ones, you may have got used to that, because we shared it several times. But people have no idea of that. They have no idea of that. That guy who says, “By Christ I won’t do that;” he has no idea of what he’s doing or what he’s saying. That’s part of why Jesus said, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” He has no idea that he is living at that very moment and using the breath of the very person whom he is cursing. They have no idea of that. They have the conventional idea that Jesus was a great religious leader; the Christians obviously believe he’s the Son of God. That doesn’t mean anything to them. They can say that, “Oh yeah, he was the Son of God.” But they don’t even know what they are saying. But least of all, have they any belief that they were created inside Jesus? They have no idea of that at all. They think you’re talking absolute drivel and philosophical mumbo jumbo. They have no idea of that at all.

And, it’s maybe good to remember that in the light of Paul’s words, you remember. In that 1 Corinthians passage he says, “To the mature we impart wisdom.” And he does make a distinction there, and we need obviously, the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, as to how we’re going to share this both personally and on the web. But it does seem to me that of course, it’s the heart of the gospel that will lift men and women.

Now I’d put it to you. I have done this, I have done as faithfully as I can what Finney [Charles Grandison Finney, 1792 – 1875, an American Presbyterian minister and leader in the Second Great Awakening in the United States], what Wesley [John Wesley, 1703 - 1791, Anglican evangelist and founder of Methodism and the Wesleyan Tradition] himself, what these guys did; I have preached sin as faithfully as I could over the years. Now I think there’s a place for it. But I think today’s generation -- I’m sure it will recognize that it’s committing sin if you preach sin to them, but that itself will not give them any rising hope. What they are convinced of is that, though they try to make a lot of themselves, and would suggest to us that they’re really quite conceited, and whether it’s the Elton John [Elton Hercules John, born Reginald Kenneth Dwight, 1947, an English singer, songwriter, composer, pianist, record producer, and occasional actor.] or the artists that have totally different attitudes from the Bob Hopes [Leslie Townes "Bob" Hope, 1903 – 2003, English-born American comedian, vaudevillian, actor, singer, dancer, athlete, and author]. The old entertainers seemed to be preoccupied with entertaining us; the new ones are being preoccupied with 'us' admiring 'them'. Even though that is very strong, and the little guy that flies his plane into the high rises [high apartment or condominium building] is 'utterly' and 'obviously' preoccupied with himself, yet I would say that underneath the normal 20th Century human being, is a dreadful sense that finally he’s a nothing. He’s just a cipher [number]; he’s just a little bit of nothingness.

Indeed, the whole theory of evolution encourages him to think that he’s little better than a piece of scum on the pond that has evolved for a few seconds and will disappear forever. So, no sense of himself as being part of the divine Son of God. No sense of that at all. No sense of how precious he is to the Maker or the Creator. A dreadful indifference to the Creator and the Maker and therefore as a result, as Schaeffer [Francis August Schaeffer, 1912 – 1984, American Evangelical Christian theologian, philosopher, and Presbyterian pastor] would have said, "A dreadful indifference to himself and to all other human beings." And so the hardness that we get on the streets, in Oxford Street, the hardness that we get in business, the harshness that we see on the millionaire show, that harshness and hardness, that indifference to other human beings, comes from the fact that they actually are, in a strange way, quite indifferent to themselves and quite hard in their attitude to themselves and don’t think of themselves as in anyway valuable.

Now of course, our present sick society is offering to them what is useless, the adulation of men, the temporary approval of the psychiatrist or the psychologists, or the temporary approval of the guy who wants to sell them something. But underneath that even, there is something of God’s image in them that says, “They don’t really think that about you. They don’t really admire you. They don’t really approve of you.” And so, underneath in our society is a great unreality, a great sense of mendaciousness, of lying, of deceiving each other, of feeling that nobody really cares for you, and deep down, "I don’t really care for anybody else."

So there’s all this emphasis on outward smiling, and outward signs of approval. And you must 'encourage' the little child. Why? To get him to do something. You should encourage people. Why? Because, well finally, it will pay you. But no sense of value themselves. And it stems directly of course, from their total failure to understand the very basis of their life: that God their Father lovingly made them inside his Son and has put his Son’s Spirit within them and that’s where any good they feel comes from. And that’s desperately the gospel that they need.

And there is good news in that. I used to think – to tell you the truth, I used to think, “Good news, good news, good news. What’s good news about I’m a sinner and I have to have my sins forgiven? I suppose that I can have my sin forgiven, I suppose that..." But you see, when you preach forgiveness of God, they think, “Why? Why have I to be forgiven?” Well, then you’re into the whole business of proving to them that they commit adultery, that they do sins in their lives.

They need to know that God loves them, but 'why' he has loved them, and 'how' he has loved them, and 'what he is doing at this moment' in loving them. They don’t need all the old general stuff, “God loves you.” They don’t believe that. And why should they? “God loves you.” “Oh, he loves me? That’s great.” But that God has personally created me, not as a little fly, not as a little British person, not as a little American, not as a little temporary human being. But he has created me 'inside himself', 'inside his only Son.' "No, it can’t be. No, Jesus came down to earth and went back up again. And he’s okay. And he’s done something..." "But that Jesus is permanently part of me? That Jesus is the Father of us all? He is the great human being in whom we all – without him we could do nothing?" They know nothing of that, nothing at all. And it seems to me this is the mystery of godliness: "Christ in you, the hope of glory."

If you say, “Do you think they have any hope of glory?” No. I mean, they’ll talk; they’ll defend themselves, “Oh, I’m as good as the next person, you know. Oh, I love my neighbor, that’s all a person can be asked.” All that silly stuff, they’ll say all that, but underneath they don’t think... “Me get into heaven? Oh well, I hope I’ll get in with the next man.” But they don’t really think that they have any "hope of glory". They really don’t think there is anything invaluable in them. And all the time our Savior is in each one of them. That’s it. All the time our Lord is in each one of them, suffering every moment, bearing the strain and stress that they create in their lives, and that they create in their families, and in their homes, and in their jobs; bearing all the strain and stress that they inflict upon his Father, and all the time sending up to them little impressions, little thoughts, little beauties: enabling a little James Galway [born 1939, a virtuoso flute player from Belfast, Northern Ireland, nicknamed "The Man With the Golden Flute"] here, to play the flute better than he could himself, enabling Previn [André George Previn, born 1929, German-American pianist, conductor, and composer, considered one of the most versatile musicians in the world] to play the piano, enabling somebody else to paint the beautiful painting, enabling some other little girl in the German prison camp to say, “This is my brother, I will die with him;” all the time Jesus alive in different human beings creating beauty.

And our job is to say, “This dear person is in you. You were created in this person, that’s why you feel this at times.” Sure, sure, they need all the historical documents, and all the intellectual backing. Sure, that needs to be done. But the purpose of doing that all is to somehow bring home to them the reality. And that is the mystery, it seems to me, that has been hidden through the ages and is revealed here. And it's found – of course, it’s plain and obvious that it’s there. It’s there in John 15; it’s there in every piece of scripture that we know so well where Jesus says, “I abide in you and you abide in me.”

The tragedy is that we have interpreted that as, “I abide in his 'principles' and his 'principles' abide in me,” or, “Somehow he’s a mysterious spiritual being here in the world, and I’ve to get close to him, and I’ve to be a friend of his, and his beauty will rub off on me: spirit dwelling with spirit.” But little sense that, “I, Joe Selzler am actually part of him.” Even, you’re his body. We’ve done it the same, “Oh yes, we’re his body." Joe does a certain thing in his body that can be looked upon as the limb of Christ. And Joanne does something else in his body that is kind of a gift that she’s been given. And so she’s in sense the body of Christ.” In a sense? But that's not it! It’s not just in his 'function' that we are part of him, it’s, "We are his body and individually members of it, of his own body; not just of his church, but of him himself."

And that is a privilege that is so beyond our dreams, that we think it’s impossible. But that, it seems to me, is the whole mystery of creation itself. It’s the whole wonder of it! And so of course, here we are inside our Father. We’re inside our Father. We’re inside Jesus who is inside his Father. We are all part – and so both of them are experiencing every little movement inside our hearts, and our minds. And that is the reality. And that transforms everything. That just transforms all of life, transforms our own attitude, but most of all, transforms our wellbeing and our existence at this moment. Of course, you can see yourselves obviously it means there is no division. All around us Wesley, Peter, Paul; all around us: our grandmothers, our grandfathers. There is no division, there’s obviously no division. But of that, our dear friends have no idea; none at all!

So loved ones, that’s our gospel. And I’m convinced that God has given us a remarkable opportunity set. If you say to me, “Are we up to it?” Not at all! We’re not bright enough; we’re not intelligent enough; we’re not clever enough: all those things, not at all! But it does seem that God has graciously made us aware of it, and he will give us grace to do what we are able to do during our years. But that is it.

Are you going to make the same mistake as I did? You’re going to throw pearls before swine? Yes! We’re going at times... We need to study 1 Corinthians there where Paul talks in that chapter there about imparting to the mature, wisdom, and that sort of thing. And only the Holy Spirit will give us light to know when to say it, and when not. And I’m sure we’re going to say it, and we’ll realize they haven’t a clue what we’re talking about. They'll think that we were bonkers!

But it seems to me, that is the glory of the gospel that God has given us. I think it’s great, because I think it’s relevant. I think it exactly hits them exactly where they live. They live exactly in that place, where they regard themselves as utterly unimportant, utterly valueless, and having no connection with the One Whom -- as C.S. Lewis said, "they regard as painted on the stain glass windows." That’s about it: the Christ of the stain glass window is about as close as they get to the idea of Christ. Where of course, it’s utterly different! Utterly!

Let us pray.

Prisoners of Christ

Prisoners of Christ

Ephesians 3:1

One of the great reliefs that we have in studying Ephesians from time-to-time is that once in a while you come upon a 'simple' sentence. And that’s what we’re dealing with today. So it’s Ephesians 3:1, and it’s just one of those simple sentences that I think God can use to bring home to us just a few little things that he wants us to know about. “For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles.” That’s it. "For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles." "For this reason" is "touto charin”, just two Greek words. And it just means that, "for this reason." What reason? Well the reason that he’s been discussing in all of Chapter 2, the fact that the gospel applied to the Gentiles and not just the Jews. So that’s it.

That was really the reason also for a lot of his suffering. And that’s why we read that New Testament passage where it was obvious that it was the Jews themselves that handed him over to the Roman authorities, because suddenly he was saying that the Messiah was for everybody. Or we would put it that Jesus’ death was for everybody. And the benefits of his death applied to everybody. And so that’s what Paul was fighting for. And that’s really finally what brought him to Rome, and brought him eventually to his final imprisonment. It was the Jews who said, “You’re saying that this Messiah is for everybody, and that salvation is for everybody.”

And it really gets back to what we’ve been talking about ourselves. There is a real difference between looking at our customers as people who need to be brought up to our level of salvation, and talking to them as people who were created in Jesus as we were, and who were crucified with Jesus as were, and were raised with Jesus as we have been, and made to sit at God’s right hand, as people whose lives have been disentangled by God’s miraculous work in Christ, before the foundation of the world. There is a real difference.

And I do think that we still have to be very clear in our own minds about the viewpoint from which we look at our customers. And part of it is simply because of the fact that most of us were brought up in either mainline churches, Catholic, or Protestant, or in the whole Evangelical tradition, which has a tendency to be exclusive rather than inclusive. And so it is an opportunity for us to say, “Well, is our attitude the narrow attitude that the Jews had, or is it this broad attitude that Paul had, where he obviously said, ‘If Christ has died for all, then all have died.’?” And it does affect, it seems to me, the way we look at our customers, the way we pray for them, the way we think of them.

And I would submit to you that many of us take the verse, “By grace you have been saved through faith,” and we are so emphasizing the faith side of it that we tend to forget, "But wait a minute, by 'grace' you have been saved." By grace God has extended to you all the he did in Jesus. And you, little one, that run the little gift shop at the end of the street in Yorkshire, God has made you in Jesus; you’re part of the Son of God. And God looks upon you like that, and he thinks of you that way, and many of the benefits that you’re receiving are because he thinks of you as his own. Whatever 'you' think, God still thinks of you that way. Why do you think you get so many good things happening to you? It’s because your Father who made you inside his Son thinks of you as the apple of his eye. And all the difficulties that you’re going to face this day, he has already seen in his Son, because all your life has been lived in his Son, because your God is able to see the end from the beginning. And he has seen your whole life stretched before him. And he has solved all the problems you’re going to have in the store today. And he will determine whether he manifests that solution today or manifests it tomorrow, or maybe only gives you the grace to continue to face it week by week. But it is not chance that runs your life it is your loving Father.

Rather than, if you have faith these things are true. No, those things are true whether they have faith or not. Faith doesn’t make them true. Faith is what enables them to experience the joy, and relief, and peace of them. But actually you could say that many of them even receive some of the benefits of them without faith, "He rains his rain on the just and the unjust." And many of them have experienced what we would call natural things like, remission of cancer, or unusual deliverances. And many of them will say that. Many of them will say, “Oh I do not know what saved me from that accident or that crash,” and it’s because God and his goodness is giving them all kinds of signs that he is alive.

Now it’s true that the 'peace' of that, and the 'rest' of it, and the 'joy' of it, and the 'delight' of it only comes to them if they can see all that, because faith is what recognizes reality. Nevertheless all those things are happening to them, out of God’s love. So it is important, what way we think of them. I frankly think myself, that it makes a big difference inside our own hearts, because it determines whether we think of them as equally equal to us and as good friends, and as people who can perhaps not understand everything we would say, but can grasp some of the commonsensical things that we’re able to share from our experience of God as our Father and it makes a difference.

It makes a difference whether you think or them as 'out there' or as 'in here'. And that’s why Paul was what he said he was, because if you look, it’s in the next phrase you see it, “For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus.” And it’s actually, “desmios” is 'prisoner'; "tou Christou Iesou”, is actually a prisoner 'of' Christ Jesus: "Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus." His life is wild. I mean, I have here four pages which just go on: Preaches in Damascus; then is persecuted by the Jews; preaches, then visits Antioch, his message is received by the Gentiles; persecuted and expelled by the Jews. He goes off to Iconium, does those four missionary journeys -- I think you’ve all looked at them at different times, but all over the then known world. The first and second journey, the third and fourth journey -- over a period of 16 years he travels all round. Up from Antioch into Galatia first of all, in the first missionary journey, and then he goes on the second missionary journey right up to Greece and Athens, and right back again. And then the next four years he does the Grecian journey again, but comes back by Ephesus, and then the fourth journey he goes from Jerusalem to Rome. And it’s true for a period of 16 years, he’s journeying back and forward, back and forward, back and forward.

Then he’s imprisoned all the time, again and again; persecuted, beaten, and cast into prison with Silas. Sings songs of praise in the prison; an earthquake shakes the prison; he preaches to the alarmed jailor who believes, and is immersed [baptized] along with his household. He visits Amphipolis, then is persecuted; escapes to Berea by night; then persecuted by the Jews who come from Thessalonica. He’s escorted by some of the brethren to Athens.

So that’s the story again and again: visits Corinth; lives with Aquila and his wife Priscilla, joins in their trade; reasons in the Synagogue every Sabbath; is rejected by the Jews. All the time the Jews on his back; all the time, ending up an imprisonment. Sends Timothy and Erastus into Macedonia; spread of the gospel through his preaching; interferes with the makers of Idols, and he’s persecuted because of that. Sends for the elders the congregation of Ephesus, relates to them how he had preached in Asia and his temptations and afflictions, urging repentance before God; declares he was going bound in spirit to Jerusalem. I mean, "bound to Jerusalem." "Desmios" is prisoner. And you will find him again, and again, not only bound in the spirit as here, but bound physically.

So the whole story goes on like that right up until he is confined, you remember, in Rome and finally is imprisoned really -- certainly as a house prisoner, but right to the end of his life. "In prison, in prison, in prison." And he says, “I, Paul, a prisoner...” Interesting: a prisoner, not of the Romans, not of the Jews, but a prisoner of Christ Jesus. And of course he puts “Christos”, “Christos” is the Messiah, the anointed one, and so he’s bringing out of here, “I’m sharing that the Messiah is available to everybody, and I’m the prisoner of this Messiah,” because he sees that it is Jesus himself who allows all these imprisonments to come.

What came home to me was, don’t you think that that is the apostolic succession that all of us have been called into, and that it is perfectly reasonable if he lived this kind of life of 16 years of journeying, and traveling, of storms, and wrecks, of being imprisoned and beaten, isn’t it reasonable to believe that we should endure a little? In other words, that really, in a sense, anyone who commits themselves to what God has done in Jesus will find himself, to some extent, bound. To some extent you’ll find your liberties’ restricted. To some extent you’ll find yourself constrained in different ways. And I just thought it’s useful to remember that, because it is easy when we believe we’ve been called to live an ordinary life as sales reps, and as business people, an ordinary life like others, and not a strange life like clergy or like members of a religious order, when we’ve been called to live as ordinary a life as possible, it’s very easy for us to fall into the trap of thinking, “Yes and we shouldn’t have to bear anything, because of Jesus. We shouldn’t have to face any disadvantages, or face any restrictions on our life." And it’s important to remember, "No, we have agreed to be the love slaves of our master Jesus, and it is perfectly reasonable to face the fact that we will in some way be prisoners, that there will be some restrictions."

We, I think, are aware that we have many benefits here together as a family of God living together. We have tremendous benefits, and we talk about them often, but there are certainly some limitations. And I was just thinking, it is important for us to remember that that’s reasonable. It’s reasonable that Jesus asks us to endure a little hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, and to face some limitations. And there are some things that we cannot do. We would probably all say, “I haven’t found them; they’re wonderful. What I find is perfect liberty, because God has worked in my heart a desire for all the things that he gives me to experience.” But still, there will be moments, it seems to me, when we can’t do things that other people can do. And really it’s nothing compared with the imprisonments that Paul and others have borne and endured.

So I was thinking, it is good to remember, that if you face some things that you find a little constricting or a little limiting, it’s good to see, “This is Jesus. I’m not a prisoner of my circumstances. I’m not a prisoner of my shortage of money. I’m not a prisoner of my inability to do this or to do that. I’m a prisoner of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what he prevents me doing, or makes it difficult for me to do, is perfect liberty. And it’s something that I rejoice in.” And it certainly seems to be the way that Paul tackled it. And in some sense you could say – he says in the next verse or the next part of the verse, “A prisoner of Christ Jesus.” And it’s “huper humon ton ethnon”, on behalf of you Gentiles. And of course it was very clear, from the early part of the verse and from our reading of his history, that of course, it was because of them that he was being imprisoned in a way, because it was because of his attitude to them, and his preaching of the gospel to them, and his telling them where they could experience the same salvation as the Jews. It was because of that that the Jews put him in prison, and so it was on behalf of you Gentiles. And it’s not bad to realize that in a sense, on behalf of our customers that is so, that we do undertake some limitations in our lives, and we do commit ourselves to some disciplines for the sake of our customers, and for the sake of them beginning to glimpse the reality of God.

So it’s worth remembering that probably when you have to get very early in the morning, or when you’re sitting in one of those tailbacks [traffic jam on the freeway], or you're walking down the street with the heavy cases [jewelry cases], it isn’t a bad thing to remember these are little things compared with the chains and shackles that Paul and other brothers and sisters of ours have borne and endured. But still, those things are for the sake of those to whom we can reveal Jesus, and to whom we can make him real.

And I think it will be the same with the websites. I certainly often felt in the two or three o’clock in the morning when I was struggling with the old computer program, I certainly felt, “This is good, because this is something that God has for me to do, and he is going to use this to make himself real to someone.” And so I don’t think that it’s romanticizing things, or being unreal, or being imaginative. I think it’s just a fact that in some sense, those who walk after Jesus are prisoners and endure some little limitations for the sake of those to whom God has sent them to witness. And so I think it is with our customers, that in some sense we’ll always find ourselves doing things that we wouldn’t chose to do if we – if it was up to ourselves. And we – there are certain limitations, and certain disciplines, and certain things that we do at odd times that we would not normally do if it weren’t for their sakes.

But I think it would be true for us, as it was for Paul, that God brought rewards by the work that he was able to do in people’s hearts. So in some sense, it is good to be able to say for this cause “I, Paul,” or “I, Marty,” or “I, Trish, am a prisoner for you Gentiles.” That is true.

Let us pray.

Dear Lord, you have given us such a path of flowers to walk, such an easy and happy road that we hesitate to ever compare ourselves at all with our older brother. But we do thank you Lord, that if there are moments when we are aware of any inhibiting of our own personal freedom, any moments when we might become aware of some discomfort, or of experiencing some things that other people do not have to face, that we can see that it is part of your calling. And indeed that part of the salvation that you work in our own inner spirits is possible because the outward man is all the time disappearing and the inward man is being strengthened. And increasingly, our outward circumstances may deteriorate, but our inward relationship with you will become stronger and richer.

So Lord, we thank you for the life you’ve called us to. And we thank you for our elder brother, and thank you for the persecutions that he endured, and the long journeys. And as we sit in the planes ourselves, or sit in the cars, we thank you Lord, that this is something that you are able to use. And so we would offer it up to you. We would offer to you Lord Jesus, the long hours that we spend driving, or talking, or working. And thank you that we can do it for your glory.

And now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with each one of us now and evermore. Amen.

We Are God’s Dwelling Place

We Are God’s Dwelling Place

Ephesians 2:22

It’s Ephesians 2:22 and I know that part of our task is to kind of help each other to catch up on where we are at present, but verse 22 you can see there is the last verse of that chapter, “In whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit” but so that you get the context of that. It surprises you in a way when you reflect how Christianity is shared in our society, because if you think about it it’s shared primarily as a way in which you can live a happier life, or in a way – a way in which you can get God to solve your problems.

It does seem if you reflect upon it, that that is the thrust of most presentations of Christianity that you come across either in books, or on television, or on radio today. It’s presented primarily as a method by which we ourselves can live a happier life, or a more fulfilled life, or a way in which we can get our problems solved. And of course when you think about that, it’s ridiculous, it’s utterly ridiculous. If this is really the God who made us all, if this is really our creator, then it’s very unlikely that we ought to be treating him as a kind of servant, or as a kind of solution to our problems.

It’s obvious that if he is the God and the Creator of the whole universe then we ought to be finding out what he wants, and what he is about rather than asking him to come in and help us with our difficulties. And I think that’s probably the biggest difference between the light that God now seems to be giving us, and the light that probably we had for years. Because I think we’re all beginning to realize that Jesus is not just kind of another prophet of God, he’s not just someone who saves us from our problems and our difficulties, but he is, believe it or not, the one in whom we were created. He is the one inside whom we were made. And you know that we’ve got that from all kinds of verses but certainly the Ephesians 2, the verses there at the beginning and especially Verse 10 are very clear, “You are we all are Gods workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” But there are many other verses such as, “In him all things were made, and without him was not anything made that was made.” Or, the verse in Colossians where it says you remember, “That Jesus was the first-born of all creation, and that all things were made in him even before the earth was made.” And so we’re beginning to see, yeah far from Jesus just being a solution to our problems or a helper for us as we try to make life successful, Jesus is the one in whom we were actually created. We were made inside him and all that we have comes from his own life.

Now that’s the heart, you remember, of what is spoken about by Paul here in Ephesians, because in Ephesians 2:19 for instance, he says, “So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.” Why? Because you have been brought near in Christ by his blood. And you can see in Verse 13, that’s what Paul says, “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near in the blood of Christ.”

In other words we were put into Jesus, created in him, crucified in him, and resurrected in him, and raised in him to God’s right hand and so now you who once were far off have been brought near in the blood of Christ. And that is something that has happened to us, and I suppose that’s what you have to get and I have to get clearly in our minds that we’re not in the old position that we used to feel we were in, that we have to somehow get near to God by mysticism or by prayer, or even by obedience. It’s not that situation, but we have actually been brought near in Jesus to God. God has looked down upon us and has put us into his Son, and raised us up with his Son, and made us sit beside him, and God has done that. We’ve been brought near and, you know, it is – it does take a lot of strain off us if we really realize, “You mean God has looked upon all that I am and has nevertheless set me beside him?” Yes that’s right, God has done that, and God has made you part of his Son, and you are part of his Son that’s just a fact.

And that’s what Paul is saying, “All of us who felt we were far from God, we have actually been brought near to God, because he has put us into Jesus himself.” As opposed to our own feeling that somehow we have to get into Jesus by meditation, or by obedience, or by our faith. No, God has made us in Jesus and has brought us right next to himself. And that’s why he says, “So then you yourselves are actually fellow citizens with the saints,” in Verse 19, “And members of the household of God,” you’re actually part of God’s household, “Built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets,” the foundation that they laid when they told us about Christ. “Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,” and so Paul is saying this is like a building, your part of the household of God in that you’re part of a building first of all. A building that he has created for himself and Jesus is the cornerstone of that building.

So a cornerstone, you know, is kind of here, it determines the alignment of that wall, and the alignment of that wall, and it determines the vertical nature of the building. The cornerstone is the key one that lines up everything else and Jesus is that cornerstone. And then he says, “Jesus himself being the cornerstone.” And verse 21, “In whom the whole structure is joined together.” So the whole structure is joined by that cornerstone, and it’s the foundation of the whole mighty structure that God has built. And the suggestion there is that God has created a whole beautiful universe, which Paul refers to here as a structure, and it has all kinds of things in it that we cannot imagine.

Presumably all kinds of plants that we have never seen before, all kinds of trees, or similar things like that. I have said to Irene at times that Shu will be there because I think – oh, Shu is the little Yorkshire terrier, but God has put here shadows of the true things that exist eternally in his presence. And I don’t know if many of you have read, Plato’s Republic, but Plato actually gets very close to that. Plato talks about a perfect table, there’s a perfect table in heaven and all other tables are just forms of that perfect table. So he has that – oh I don’t know how he got hold of that, but he got hold of the idea that there is an ideal of everything in heaven and what we have here are only shadows or forms of that. And that’s the case, God has a whole structure of which Jesus is the cornerstone and it is built probably of universes. Probably of universes, certainly of many planets, but probably of whole universes, He has a whole structure that is built upon Jesus, and in Jesus we are part of that structure.

And that’s what the next verse says, “In whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord,” and the Greek word “joined together” means joined together just like that, you know. I don’t know if you – I may not be using the right terminology but a mortar’s joint in woodwork means that you cut one piece of wood in such a way that it fits in the mortise and the tenon fit in exactly, and they fit closely together, and this one is cut just the right shape for this one to go into it, and that’s what the verb means, everything is fitly joined together. And now I think you begin to see why you are here and why we are here together, because we’re fitly joined together in Jesus.

That is Joe has certain abilities and Jesus will beget at him other abilities and other insights that will fit exactly with abilities and insights that he gives to Trish, and those will fit together exactly with other insights and abilities that he gives to Marty or to Greg. And so the whole structure is fitted together from eternity exactly in the right way. That’s why our method of vocational guidance is so crude, “Oh you seem to be good at math so you should be an accountant. Oh, you seem to be good with your hands so you should be a carpenter.” It’s such a hit and miss approach we have, so crude and coarse taking little into consideration of the fact that Jesus is working inside each one of us today, and bringing new light to us and new insights. And that I think is the exciting part of what the whole web ministry, because it seems to me that Jesus has planned for each one of us to be here together, and he will fitly join us together in a way that is far more precise and far more detailed than you can ever imagine.

I mean at the moment I talk about, well Joe seems to be good on how to structure a website, or how to manipulate the program Meva, and Martha seems to be good text and on writing, and Joanne seems to be good on presentation and design, but really that’s just my crude insight into it. The fact is that Jesus is doing all kinds of invisible things in each one of you. And he has things to bring about in you, and to bring out through you, that even you yourself do not know at this moment and that’s what these verses are saying, that we are the structure that God is building inside his Son here on earth, and it is a structure where every – each one of us is carefully designed to work with the other. So it’s not chance at all that we are here together, and it does not even depend in a sense, on what our natural abilities are because there are all kinds of inner natural abilities, supernatural really but natural in Jesus, abilities that God is bringing forth.

Now if you look you can see how it goes on, “In whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord.” And the word grow – of course here you see Paul moving from the whole idea of a building to when he uses grow, a building doesn’t grow a plant grows, the vine grows, he moves into the idea of an organic, really a body of Jesus, and grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In other words there is within each one of us, the life of Jesus, and that life is growing and beginning to develop in new ways and that I think is what’s exciting.

If that weren’t the case, you’d run down. The second law of thermodynamics would take into effect, and the gray hair would always mean that you’re running down. The system is running down, it’s wearing out, but because of Jesus within us there’s a growing that is taking place more and more and as the outward body is decaying the inward being is being renewed more and more until eventually, at the moment of death, it will burst out and as on the mount of transfiguration, it will overcome the weakness of the old outward nature. And that it what is taking place, we’re growing all the time, inside you Jesus is developing more and more the abilities that he has given to you. And so really we should just as we really do see from time-to-time in an Einstein, because in certain ordinary characters God has manifested this, as you see in Einstein, or you see in a Rubinstein, you see a development and a refining of their talent and abilities. So that’s what will take place, that is God’s plan for us here, we will grow and develop in our ability to do what he has brought us together to bring about.

So that’s part of what that verse means, “And grows into a holy temple in the Lord,” and then of course the last verse, “In whom you also,” because it’s in Jesus, “In whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.” And that’s the overwhelming reality. Why are you here in this world? For a dwelling place of God in the Spirit, that’s really why you and I exist, so that God can dwell in us here on this earth. And what’s come home to me more and more is the only way that can come about is because of the last three words. He is the only one who can bring this about in us. The Spirit is Jesus within us it’s only in the Spirit that we can come into this.

Now I don’t know how dear the Holy Spirit, has become to you, but it’s only – he’s the only one who can bring about this in us. I don’t know how preoccupied you are with what I think of you, or what Joanne thinks of you, or what Marty thinks of you, or what Joe thinks of you, or what Greg thinks you should do, or what Myron thinks you should do, but that’s all irrelevant. There’s only one who knows what you should do, and that’s the Spirit of Jesus within you, and everything depends on your attitude to him. What surprised me a few days ago was, to what extent is the Spirit, the Lord God to me? To what extent is the Spirit, the Lord God to me? And to what extent is he a kind of helper, little helper? To what extent do I yearn to hear what he’s saying and do I utterly respect and obey what he says? And it seems to me that’s the key to this growing in Jesus, and this becoming what he has made us for, our respect and honoring and obedience to the Holy Spirit who is Jesus. And I wonder to what extent maybe we’ve thought of the Spirit as helper and aide, and kind of a messenger from Jesus, but not really Jesus himself, but it seems to me he is the Lord himself within us.

Let’s us pray.

Consequences of Refusing the Holy Spirit

Consequences of Refusing the Holy Spirit

Ephesians 2:18

What we discussed earlier and really what we were saying together and it makes it really clear that there is common grace that is experienced by everybody. That God rains his rain on the just and the unjust and everybody experiences God’s love and God’s goodness. Indeed, that’s why we’re alive here on earth, because he has kept us alive even though we ought to be dead. So in fact everybody, lesbian, homosexual, everybody experiences that, that common grace. Not everybody is experiencing redeeming grace and it seems to me that is one of the distinctions that’s very clear that there’s a common grace that all men and women experience whether they’re born of God or not, and then there is a redeeming grace that is experienced by those who enter into that.

So, that’s the heart, I think, of Romans 1:18, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of men who by their wickedness suppress the truth.” And this is the common grace, “For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse; for although they knew God they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals or reptiles. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. Their woman exchanged natural relations for unnatural, and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in their own persons the due penalty for their error.” And of course, you can see that in spite of the fact that God had shown himself to them. And yet, in fact, because they did not recognize him, whatever they say and I suppose that’s the heart of it, whatever the dear hearts say when they find themselves given up to these passions, that’s the evidence that they – whatever they say is not really true at its deepest level.

They may say, “Oh yes, we honor him as God and we depend upon him.” Yes but then you wouldn’t be like that you wouldn’t live that kind of life. “And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a base mind and to improper conduct. They were filled with all manner of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity, they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s decree that those who do such things deserve to die, they not only do them but approve those who practice them.” And so of course, we need to pray all the more for dear hearts that talk, about God’s goodness, and about his love, and about his faithfulness and yet put themselves into this category of those who really still do not acknowledge God in their own everyday lives and pray ourselves to come clear of that hypocrisy.

Ephesians loved ones; we’re at actually that following versus which is very succinct. Ephesians 2:18, “For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.” Through him, and of course, you can see it’s the trinity really. Through is “dia”, it’s like that, “dia”, through, through Jesus and through him, we both have access, “en”. That’s “dia” diaphragm, through to the Father and the “pros”. Through him we have access in one spirit to the Father “pros”. And so it’s the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit and really, the whole of the gospel is there. And then sometimes that’s translated by but it’s really the Greek word “en”, in the Spirit and I think there’s some significance in that because you could say we all have access, including that one – I don’t want to keep battering that one but it’s a clear example that came up in a conversation, including the lesbians and homosexuals, we all have access in the sense it brings out, apparently according to the commentators, the old idea of the eastern life where you need someone to introduce you to the king, or the queen, so they provide an access to that person.

So in that sense, everybody has that access whether we actually come through to the Father is another question, but we all have that access. And so the lesbians, and the homosexuals have it also, and you might say also they have access to some of the benefits of God’s love, the rain drops on the just and the unjust, and probably even the encouragement. I’m sure God gives encouragement to those who do not even obey him as he seemed to give us encouragement to come to him and to seek him even when we didn’t obey him.

So undoubtedly, God does give benefits and blessings of common grace to all of us and in that sense we all, both Jews and Gentiles, both those who are afar off and those who are near. Those who are absolute atheist and have no hope, and those who have some of the promises that the Jews had and of course, those of us who are Christians and know the reality of Jesus, we all have access in that sense to the Father through Jesus Christ in the Spirit to the Father. And of course, what changes the whole thing really is here at this level because you have access, you can have an introduction to the king and the queen, you can even go into their presence, but to come into that close childlike trust, and love of the Father, that is the mark of those who are in the Spirit, that is something that can only be received through the Holy Spirit himself, through “pneumati” you remember, is the Greek word through the Spirit, “pneumatos”. And only through the Spirit can you come into the real experience of that oneness.

That’s where common grace you remember and redeeming grace divides. Everybody experiences common grace, but redeeming grace is only experienced by those who are born of the Spirit, those who not only believe God’s character, but who enter into the reality that he calls them to, the reality of obedience to him and oneness with his will. Whereas this common grace is experienced by all people, so there is a great difference.

Some have said that atonement is universal. But universal atonement, but regeneration is conditional and that condition is of course, dealing with the only one who can bring you into oneness with the Father. There is a commentator who has put it, I don’t know that I can find his phrase, but yes he says, “To God, that is that friendly relation with God whereby we are acceptable to him and have assurance that he is favorably disposed towards us, that friendly relation with God whereby we are acceptable to him and have assurance that he is favorably disposed towards us.” And that comes about in the Spirit. That’s why the Bible is full of those words that say, “By their fruits you shall know them,” or says, “The Spirit himself bears witness,” you remember, Romans 8:15, “with our spirit that we are the children of God.”

So many people know that God loves them, know God’s character, even they may feel they’ve experienced it and who are we to say that they haven’t experienced it? But that’s very different from coming into a place in the Spirit where you have access to the Father in this inner way where the Spirit himself bears witness with your spirit that you’re a child of God and that your life is filled with the kind of fruit that pleases him, and that is beloved by him, and that is the purpose of our being created in Jesus, and being crucified, and resurrected in him.

So there is a great difference. I would mention to you again, that it does seem to me that we have grasped this, that we are part of Christ, that we have been created in Jesus, and it’s because of that that we are able to have any access to God. We have actually been made part of Jesus and that is why we have access to God. But the reality of that is actualized by the spirit. So through Jesus Christ, but in the Spirit we have access to the Father. I don’t know if you’ve settled in your own mind what the Spirit is, but it seems to me certainly that it is certainly Jesus in us, but it seems to me the Spirit is – at times we feel it is our conscience but at other times it seems even to go beyond our conscience and it is that sense we have, that quiet impression that we have within, that we should do certain things and that there are other things that we should not do. And it does seem to me, that if you stop listening to that voice, or you stop treasuring the impressions of the Spirit within you, that you may continue to be like the rest of the people who enjoy common grace.

You may even believe like them, that Christ has died for everybody, but you will not experience that friendly relation with God whereby we are acceptable to him and have assurance that he is favorably exposed towards us. We will not experience that inner witness of the Spirit unless we obey the Spirit. And I would mention to each of us, and myself as well, that when we grieve the Holy Spirit, or when we begin to sit loosely beside him, or when we get used to rationalizing his directions to us, I would submit to you that that’s when we begin to lose a sense of the closeness of God and lose the joy of our salvation, and this is – you can’t say that either of the persons of the trinity are more important than the others, but in many ways it’s our grieving the Holy Spirit, and the impressions that he gives to us within, that at times, separates us from the joy of being God’s children and relegates us back into the position of those who are afar off, or those that enjoy certainly the common grace of God, and we still believe – we still believe of course, Jesus died for all men, but we don’t live in the inner joy of that and it’s because of a failure here at this level.

It’s there that the daily – you can say obedience but don’t you think that it goes deeper than obedience as you begin to deal with the Holy Spirit? Because, his voice is so gentle that you can hardly call it a command, but it is little impressions that he gives you, “I’d like you to do this. I’d like you to do that.” I think often we get caught in the pretense and deception of Satan who would urge us, “Look, this is not a do or die matter. You are in Jesus. You are given to him. This is not a big deal.” But it seems to me the more we walk with the Holy Spirit, the more big deals the little deals are. The more important it is to walk close to him and to respond to what he says.

I can see it in regard to our own – primarily in regard to our own relationship, and our own delight in our Father, and his enjoyment of us, but it also will increasingly be important as we walk forward into this new ministry of the website, and the possibility of the service, of having the service on the web, the Holy Spirit will have all kinds of little details, little things that he will guide you to do, or guide me to do. Little uploading of things that nobody will see, you’ll do it – well, I hope not at one o’clock in the morning, but at 10 o’clock at night you load something up, the Holy Spirit will prompt you to do it and if you don’t listen to him then there will be water of life that will not flow as he planned it to flow. And so it seems to me increasingly the sensitivity to the Holy Spirit is more and more vital for all of us.

So, through Jesus Christ, in the Spirit, we have access to the Father. If you’re wondering about your access, it either is in your getting preoccupied with yourself and not living enough in the joy and the delight that yourself has been done away with long ago and you are part of this wonderful person full of spaciousness and full of magnanimity, that you’re a part of him. It’s either that, failing there, or being casual in your respect for the voice of the Holy Spirit within you, because both of them will give you continual access to the Father. Let us pray.

Jesus Brings Absolute Peace

Jesus Brings Absolute Peace

Ephesians 2:17

Let’s take our Bibles please and turn to Ephesians 2:17 we’re at today, Ephesians 2:17, “And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.” “And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.” And of course, we can remember some of the words that Jesus preached when he said, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you, not as the world giveth I not onto you.” So there were several places where he preached peace himself to us, but of course he preached it also to his Apostles who then preached it to us also.

But what do you think it will be like the moment after you die? What do you think it will be like, or maybe a moment after that? I mean, will you go out into the sky, and out into all that space, and just feel lonely and desperate? And that’s where it’s pretty important to have somebody who has been out there and who can tell you what to expect, and that’s what – part of what the verse means, that there has come to us someone who has been out there, and who assures us, “I am going to prepare a place for you, that where I am, there you may be also. In my Father’s house are many mansions for if it were not so would I have told you? I am going to prepare a place for you.” And that’s what Jesus says to us. He assures us it will not be a wild desolate sky that we go into. The first thing you’ll see is your Father’s dear face, and his arms stretched out towards you to receive you into his home, and so that’s what death will be like.

So of course, Jesus brings to us a great peace there by what is going to happen the moment after we die. But what the verse says to is that he’ll bring peace to us everywhere. Of course, it’s good if you have a wife whose name is that, “eirene” and then you could always encourage her, but that’s the word that Jesus uses, “eirene” and it’s two parts and this part “rene” seems to be a verb that strangely enough means “to join”. So that peace is not just an absence of war and yet it is, that’s the opposite word, that’s the opposite English word, you know, peace, it’s not rest and activity it’s peace and war. So “polemos” I think, “polemos” is the word for war, which is very different and that’s where you get polemics, you remember, when you talk about philosophy or theology polemics, as opposed to “eirenics” of course, “eirene” is peace, but it’s join, it’s to join, it’s the very opposite of course of this fighting, and striving that is in war and Jesus came and preached peace to us. He came and preached peace.

He preached a joining of things, of peace in everything. And that is his will, and his Father’s will before us, it’s for peace. Peace in everything. Peace when our little hearts beat about death, peace there and joining, a sense that all will be well, our Father has it planned, he knoweth our frame that we are weak and so he will be right there if one of us says, “Oh but I’m a nervous kind of person, or I’m a fearful kind of person, or my brother never liked to talk, or I’m afraid of the dark.” God knows our framework and he will be there and he will help us through.

So peace has all that feeling, you know, of joining things together. And of course, Jesus speaks peace to those who are near and to those who are a far off, and that ties up somewhat with what we talked about several Sundays ago, about sharing these things with those who are a far off, because that’s what the verse says, “He came and preached peace to you who are a far off.” He was speaking to the Gentiles, “And to you who are near.” And you remember, the Gentiles were the ones who had none of the hopes or the signs that the Jews had that God really loved them and cared for them. That was the difference between the Jews and the Gentiles, the Jews had prophets who said, “Though your sins are scarlet they shall be as white as snow and though they’d be like crimson they shall be as wool.” The Jews were the ones who received promises from God through Abraham, and through Isaac, and through Jacob that they would have a land flowing with milk and honey, and that they would have power and strength to overcome their enemies.

So they had many signs that God was with them and was not against them. The Gentiles didn’t. The Gentiles had none of those signs, they had only their pagan religions, their animism, their worship of the little well at the end of the village street, so they had no assurance of what it was like behind the sky. So are our dear friends that we meet day-by-day, be it the man who is at the gas station and takes our money, or the one who is in the store who we hope will take our product. They are in the same position as Gentiles they have no certainty at all.

There is a great vagueness, “Oh when we get up there into the great beyond we will know everything,” and there’s a lot of light talk about that. So man cannot live without hope, even hopeless hope, so there is hopeless hope in some of their hearts, but beneath it all is a great trembling, and a great tremor, and a great uncertainty about what is going to happen after this world is over. That’s why they often joke about it and treat it lightly, because they dare not think about it too seriously, the fear would strike at their heart. And so that’s their situation, and yet this verse says that Jesus comes and preaches peace to those who are far off as well as those of us who are near.

So it does seem that there is a lot of place for sharing reality as it is. And undoubtedly there’s a way to talk about life and death that is realistic, but it need not be totally lacking in the certainties that we have, and that we have heard from our Savior. And it is possible it seems to me, in certain situations, even in ordinary conversation, it is possible in a non-religious way, and a non-precious way to say, “Well of course, there is certainly one person who has been through to the other side, and assures us that life is going to be beautiful for us after this life is over.” In other words there are ways in which we can share even that kind of a spiritual truth with those whom we’re speaking to, because Jesus came to assure them also that there is certainty after this life. We have to share what he has told us, we are not called upon to work out the best way by which they can come into receiving him as their savior. We are called upon to preach the certainties that we know about.

Now I think they will be very quick themselves to realize that they need to make some move towards the Savior, but really the truth is unless they make a move towards him because they are drawn to him and because they have an honest heart to him, there’s no danger of the Holy Spirit failing to do his faithful work in convicting them of sin. But it is just worthwhile remembering that preaching peace he comes to preach peace to those who are far off as well as to those who are near.

What I thought was important for us to grasp today was that, that is his will to bring absolute peace in every area of our lives. And I don’t know if you are aware of some places in your own heart or your own life where you haven’t absolute peace, but his will is absolute peace, not only his will but he has made that possible. In other words, when our minds become anxious about the sales, or about what this person thinks of us, or that person thinks of us, or when our minds become worried and anxious about what we’re going to do about this situation, this financial situation, or this person’s situation, that is a lack of peace. That is disruption that is the chaos of war, that is where our minds fight against the facts, and our feelings fight against our minds, and that is war that is not peace. And there is some way in which we are not living in reality at that moment because Jesus has said, “Have no anxiety about it.” And through Paul he said, “And everything by prayer and supplication let your request be made known to God.” And he himself said, “I tell you do not be anxious about your life, what you’ll eat, or what you’ll drink, or what you’ll put up. Look at the lilies of the field they do not sow, they do not toil, and yet Solomon in all is glory was not arrayed like one of these.” If the one who clothes the sparrow or clothes the flowers of the field loves you he will clothe you. Are you not of much more value than many sparrows? And Jesus has assured us that those things are taken care of.

So when there’s a lack of peace inside in our emotions, and in our heads, and in our minds it’s because we’re not living in the reality that he has brought, and he has come to preach peace to us. Now if it was me or Norman Vincent Peale saying those things you could legitimately say, “What do you know? You’re telling me not to have any anxiety about these things, but these things are real, these are difficulties that I’m about to face this coming week, now what can you do about them?” We’d have to say, “Nothing.” But this is Jesus who has come and preached peace to us. This is God’s own Son who has said, “Have no anxiety about it.” This is the one who has control and has the power in his hands to make things work.

I don’t know if you’ve experienced much of it, I’ve experienced some of it, the quiet time getting a bit ragged, and then after a number of days, or weeks, or sometimes months, then realizing that it’s ragged and then bringing it together again, and life seems to go most peacefully. I’ve certainly experienced that and I’d be slow to say that because I’m not too gung-ho on that magical stuff, but I think that’s the deeper meaning of peace. Peace is when all things are joined together, when everything is working the way it’s meant to work. Peace is when life is just flowing. Not that there are no difficulties, but they are details, they are little – not just things that we call bumps in the road, we’re aware they’re just a bump in the road, they’re hardly noticeable. But life itself has a flow to it and there’s a sense of the day going gently forward as it’s meant to go.

All I can say to you is, from my experience it’s very different from this kind of existence. It’s very different when the life flows. It’s very noticeable, it’s plain to you, you come to the end of the day and it’s easy, it’s been a nice day, things have gone well, everything hasn’t gone perfectly, but generally there’s been a flow and you feel that it’s gone the way God wanted it to go. Now it seems to me that’s the deeper meaning of the verse, that Jesus came and preached peace both to those who were a far off and those who were near. He said, “There is a way for life to go here on earth that has a peace about it, an integration a coordination about it so that you’ll feel it yourself.”

In other words, there is a deep oneness between you – I don’t want to get too mystical about this, between you and this table, and the air, and the other minds in this room, and even the old car that you’ll drive, there is a mystical connection between all those – among all those things, that enables you to affect them and to be in harmony with them. There is a deep peace that Christ brings into the whole of life through his death and resurrection, and that’s part of what probably Armstrong (Lance Armstrong) feels. He feels that just a rough kind of touch of it when he’s riding in the Tour de France and everything seems to go well, and he’d say, “Everything just seemed to flow. My legs seemed to pump up and down like jack hammers without any difficulty at all.” And then there are other times when the thing seems to be a grind and a burden.

Now I think he, at that time, touches the spiritual flow of the river that is God’s norm for us in our everyday life and that’s what peace is. Peace is not just peace among friends, or agreeing with each other, or being close to each other, peace is a deep harmony that runs through us and runs through the life that we’re living. So I think we caught glimpses of it with people likes St Francis of Assisi, you know, who seemed to have a oneness at times with the animals and with birds. It seems to me that’s just an example of it, but what we are intended for is a oneness and a harmonious flow in our everyday life that comes directly from the cross of Calvary where Jesus overcame the world, and caught all the different threads, all these bits and pieces, you know, all this person and that person, my money, my job, my car, my body, and he brought them all together into him and jointed them into one life and this is the life that he has for us, that Jesus has come and preached peace both to those who are near and those who are far. Let us pray.

Ministers of Reconciliation

Ministers of Reconciliation

Ephesians 2:16

Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill

Will you take a Bible please and turn to Luke 10:29, “But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’ Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him, and departed, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was; and when he saw him, he had compassion, and went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; then he set him on his own beast and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ Which of these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?’ He said, ‘The one who showed mercy on him.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do thou likewise.’” And of course, we know this parable by heart and we all of course, agree how dreadful the Levite was and how unchristian that whole attitude is.

But, what we’ve really been talking about in the studies in Ephesians is much the same kind of thing, because we’ve been sharing you remember, how the Gentiles and the Jews were so distant from each other. Probably especially because of the Jews’ attitude, the Jews regarded the Gentiles as knowing nothing about the God of the universe and they regarded them as really pagans compared with themselves. And you remember, we followed through how that came about because really, God had destroyed everybody in his Son Jesus before the foundation of the world and in effect he had done that for everybody Jew and Gentile, but it’s just from the early years of the worlds history he made the Jews aware that he had done that work. Not clearly, because it was a mystery to them, as far as they could get was the idea of a suffering servant that in some way was despised and rejected of men and in some way had borne their sins. But they really didn’t know that they and every man and woman on the earth had been committed into Christ, had been created in Christ, and crucified in him, and raised up in him, and was in the Father’s heart and arms at that very moment. But the Jews were given some signs that that was so.

You know how God did it, he revealed himself to people like Abraham and he made it clear to people like Isaiah, “Though your sins are scarlet they shall be as white as snow and I will bear your sins and in fact, I bear them at this very moment.” And even though it wasn’t clearly in black and white to them, still the Jews had a sense that the God who created the world loved them, and had mercy towards them, and had a steadfast love towards them that would go on and on however wretched, and disobedient, and poor, and faithless they were. And of course, the Jews knew that and they knew that these Gentiles didn’t know that and so you remember, how then there developed in them an attitude of superiority to the Gentiles. An attitude, which you remember, set up the middle wall of partition it was called in the temple, and the Gentiles couldn’t come into the court of the Jews, and they couldn’t get access to the holy place. And the Jews had an attitude of superiority and thought of the Gentiles as over there. And then you remember, how we shared together that it was very easy to condemn the Jews for that attitude but in a way to have some of that attitude ourselves, especially in regard to the people we visit, and the people we do business with day-by-day.

It’s very easy to have a subtle attitude, “Well, they’re not Christians, you know. They’re not Christians.” Or, “He swears like a trooper and he has no understanding of God.” We may say that they have no relation to God yet in our deep inner heart we feel, “They are different from us. I mean, there’s no question, of course they know nothing of our chapel service, of course they know nothing of Christian Corps., of course they know nothing about Jesus and about his being crucified for us and us being crucified with him. Of course, they don’t know those things and so in a sense, I’m limited as to how much I can feel I’m their brother,” and dare I change that word to, “How much I can feel I’m their neighbor.” And isn’t it true that it’s very easy to adopt an attitude in our lives of them and us.

We used to joke about it, you remember, I forget which house it was but you remember, one of the houses we had in Minneapolis on the University of Minnesota campus, had started off with eight people in it and I think three of them were Christians and five of them were not Christians and we used to joke of course, the lions are five and the Christians are three, and then the next week of course, the Christians are four and the lions are four, you know, gradually it changed of course and until everybody was Christian there were no lions left. But often that can be our own secret attitude, that it’s them and us. In a way they are in some sense the enemy. They’re certainly people that don’t understand the things that we understand and of course what these verses are bringing home to us in Ephesians is not so. Not so.

You are inside a dear person and have been created as part of him, and he has borne you, and borne your sin, and borne all that you could give, and he has allowed it to be destroyed in himself, and almost as in the song, that you sang going home just next door is the person who you’re selling jewelry too. Just an artery away in Jesus’ body is the person that you regard as them, as a Gentile and that’s what this verse is saying. I’d just ask you to look at it; it carries it a little further in today’s verse. It’s Ephesians 2, and the verse we studied last day you remember – well, to get the context you’d read from Verse 14, “For he,” Jesus, “Is our peace, who has made us both one,” that is the Jew and Gentile, “And has broken down the dividing wall of hostility.” And Verse 15 we studied last time, “By abolishing in his flesh the law of commandments and ordinances,” all those laws that showed to the Jews what God was like, all the temple worship, all those things that enabled them to suspect that the God who had created them had mercy towards them and was loving towards them. “That he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace” and then today’s verse, “And might reconcile us both to God.” us both, the Jew and the Gentile. Me, the person in Christian Corps., and the person tomorrow in the store whom I’m going to sell jewelry to, “Might reconcile us both to God in one body,” inside himself, “Through the cross, thereby bringing the hospitality to an end.” And what comes home to you as you look more closely at this verse is that this is something that God has already done.

The word for reconcile is a word that looks in Greek, like this, “apokatallasso”. Like that. It means – that means other. The whole world means reconcile but it’s interesting to look at the entomology of it, because this is the word for “allos” “other” in Greek and this is the word back, and this has the meaning of make us other, make us other than we are. It’s interesting, make us other, make us different from what we are and what the verse is saying is God has in Christ, made us other than we are. He’s made us different from what we are and back has the sense of bringing us back to God, or restoring us to God. So it has the sense of making us different from what we are, and restoring us to God as we originally were.

In other words, that the Gentile and the Jew were both made in Christ from the very beginning as were the CCI person and the buyer. They were both originally made in Christ. They were both one in Christ, and then they used their free wills to stand up for themselves and not listen to what God wanted them to do and gradually they grew further, and further away from each other. And what happened in Christ, God saw that that was taking place and in Christ he restored them to himself, made them other than they had become down here, and reconciled them to each other. But the whole meaning of it is, the whole emphasis of it is, that God has done that. God has actually made us one and it is the deception of this world that persuades us that we are not one. And we can continue to live in that deception and live with that feeling of distance from them, or we can live in the reality that God has brought about.

To bring it even more clearly to you, if you look at the last part of the verse and you look at the Greek, “Might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross.” Here – I mean, this is terrible but this is the blessed Savior, and there’s the Jew, and there’s the Gentile, and here’s the CCI person, and here’s the buyer. In this one body, both of these people were made and as they determined to run their own life, and go their own way, they pulled that dear body apart, and they pulled, and they pulled, as they used to do on the racks. Put a person on the rack, and you remember they had great levers here by which they pulled the arms out and out to try to convince the people of course, to believe what they wanted them to believe. In that same way, these people tore this dear body apart, and that’s what the meaning of the cross is, that on the cross that body bore all the strains, and all the stresses, and all the hatred, and all the wrath as this one hated this one, this one hated this one, this one tried to make himself feel more secure than this one. So all that pulled in that dear body and that dear body held itself together on the cross and pulled them, pulled them back together and made them one bearing the pain in his own body, bearing their sin in his own body.

Every – every little frown on the face, every little stress in the body as this person confronts this person, every little feeling inside different, “They’re different from me, they’re not the same. They have not experienced Jesus as I have,” every little strain is born by this dear Savior in here and pulls apart what he has borne pain to draw together. So there’s a deep reality in the truth that we are one, and yet when we pull ourselves apart, we pull the Savior apart also.

Why I think it’s important, is of course, because of the very last phrase of the verse and also because of the real feeling that I think you recognize in your own heart, because as we talk about this you think to yourself, “Well yeah, I mean, I know what you say is right that I do have a tendency to think of them as them and us as us, and I do have a tendency to think well I’m a Christian and I do know the Bible and I do pray every day and they don’t, and I don’t swear and they do swear, and I do have a tendency to make those distinctions. But to tell you the truth, I can’t actually see how I can get out of those. Those are just feelings that are inside of me and they’re pretty natural and I’ve tried – I’ve tried to change them, I try to pretend otherwise, but I don’t see how to do it.” And there is no way you can do it unless, God has done something with it and that’s the last phrase of this verse.

Ephesians 2:16, “And might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby bringing the hostility to an end.” And actually that doesn’t, that doesn’t really translate the Greek very well because the Greek is a word called, “apokteino”, it’s the aorist, “apokteinos” and it means destroyed. And “tein achthron” wrath, hospitality, or maybe it brings it home more if we use the old jargon of our own society, hostile feelings, “Oh you have some hostile feelings towards him.” God destroyed the wrath. God in Christ destroyed that feeling that you and I have about these so called neighbors. God destroyed that, we do not need to feel that way. We do not need to feel, “Oh well, they swear and I don’t. They gamble and I don’t. Well, they don’t go to church. Well, they have no understanding of these things.” You don’t need to feel that. You feel that because you choose to feel it, because God in Christ destroyed that hostility, he actually destroyed that.

This actually took place. We have a tendency to look at that and say, “Oh, that’s a nice picture what you’ve done. Oh yeah, that’s a nice metaphor.” No, no that’s reality. If Christ died for all, all died. No, you have died and your life is hid with Christ in God. No, that is the spiritual fact, God has made the whole world right in his Son, and he has reconciled the world to himself. He has brought all this about. No, any feeling we have that – well, you know, “Well, I can’t possibly feel the same way as this person as I do towards Trish. You know, there’s no way. I mean, I can’t, I can’t feel the same way.” God says, “Yes you can.” What they feel is up to them and that is their freedom. What the society feels or expects you to feel about them, that’s up to them. But you yourself are free to love them as your very own self, to love your neighbor as yourself. You are free to treat them as part of yourself. And of course, you know, just as your mind begins to grasp that you see, “Oh yeah. Oh well, it fits in doesn’t it? It fits in with the whole thing of you treat a person the way you want them to be,” and that’s part of what faith is, seeing them as they really are except that now you see, that’s not just a trick, that’s not just a little strategy, that’s not just a little power of positive thinking, that’s not just a little way to exercise faith so that we can bring about the things that Wigglesworth or Hagen bring about. No, no, that is reality.

They are part of us. They are part of our Jesus, part of our Savior. Our attitude of distance to them was destroyed by God in Christ. It is destroyed. If we choose to continue to have that we can but we’re choosing a deception and a lie, and we’re putting ourselves under the power of the father of lies, and that’s actually where the other feelings come from. It’s quite interesting. That’s why you may say, “Oh well, there’s something that makes me feel this is right and that they are different from me.” Yes, yes, because once you put yourself under the father of lies he begets in you all kinds of attitudes from the principalities and powers that result in a real hostility and a really critical attitude to them. But if you abide in truth, then you will see, “This is my brother. He was crucified with Christ, he is part of me, and my father loves him as he loves me, and is ready to drench him with generosity, and kindliness, and prosperity.”

Only the Holy Spirit can show you how to talk in the light of these things, you can see that. Only the Holy Spirit can show you how to speak to that, or to our business associates in the light of that. But you can see plainly that it certainly means you can’t just use your own common sense which is so tinged with this lie. It certainly means that you have to go beyond what you’ve probably been doing up to now with your business associates. Only the Holy Spirit can tell you how that’s to be expressed. But certainly – I can certainly see that God does rain his rain on the just and the unjust, and I can certainly see that it’s very reasonable to expect that our dear Father would pour out his graciousness on a person’s business even if they weren’t acknowledging him as their God.

In other words, I can see that there are many things that they can experience from our dear Creator simply because he loves them, whatever their attitude is. And I can see how it’s our own narrow minded legalism that in a way, wants them to buy their ticket into the blessings of heaven. Well, when – if we hear of them receiving Christ as Savior, or if we hear that they believe in God, then we can come in and say, “Now, now God will prosper the work of your hand.” Well, doesn’t he prosper the work of many hands that don’t apparently know him? Doesn’t he pour out blessings on many people who aren’t Christians? In other words, isn’t there a great truth here that we can share with them in all openness, a great truth regarding the generosity, and the goodness, and the kindliness of the Father that has made us? And aren’t there ways even in which his Son’s tender heart can be expressed through our attitude to them? So I think it’s a wonderful – I think it’s a wonderful life that we have and a wonderful ministry, and we are called to be the ministers of reconciliation. Let us pray.

Dear Lord, we think of the men and women that we will see these coming days. We think Father, of how so many of them think of themselves, sometimes as very good and moral people, but often as people who have no religion in them at all, and who do not expect any particular blessing from the person who has made them. And we see Lord, that we either build them up in their most holy faith or we build them up in their most holy unfaith. Lord, we see that we either are used by you to confirm your love and tenderness towards them, and your bearing with them year, after year, or we are used to impress upon them that they are not right, they are not behaving properly, and they cannot expect your favor.

So Lord, we would ask you through your Holy Spirit, to give us light about these verses and above all, enable us to live in the reality of the cross and in the reality of what you have wrought in Christ. Enable us to treat no man from a purely human point of view, but to treat every man as one for whom you have died and therefore, one who has died with you. And if he is in you, he is a new creation and the old has passed away and the new has come. And enable us to speak to that new soul simply and so winsomely that they themselves will begin to grasp that they are new and will begin to live in the reality of the newness and the resurrection.

Now the grace of our Lord Jesus and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each of us now and ever more. Amen.